Morning Thoughts 11-8-16

As of late, I've been halfheartedly considering what would happen if I started coming out to more and more people. I am nowhere near ready to do that yet, but the longing to get this part of me off my chest so I can unabashedly be myself is very great.
Being an ABDL is a weird thing (obviously). Here's this thing that you seemingly were just born with where you want to be little and be able to express that desire accordingly through clothes, diapers, stuffies, etc. However, especially in the case of males in this context, children are pressured to "grow up" and give up childish things as soon as possible. Wanting to go back to wearing diapers and cute clothes is a direct subversion of the "be a man" narrative that is prevalent among parental guidance norms over male children and young adults in the U.S. Not to mention, in general, that men are supposed to be the ones who are strong and provide. We are not supposed to be seen as vulnerable, or shy, or weak. Please note that I am not attempting to advance an anti-feminist narrative or imply that men are the ones who are being oppressed. The fact is that both men and women are oppressed by patriarchal forces. Some men realize that they are oppressed, but instead wrongly blame feminism for it instead.
I digress. Anyways...
I have come out to two people in my life so far. One person is my best friend/partner. I had been friends with him for a few months, and I felt that he was one of the most trustworthy people I knew. I told him and was immediately accepted. In the next breath he offered to be the one to change me and take care of me. At that point I melted in a way that I had never before in my life. Later on, this person would tell me that my ABDL tendencies made them discover their own need for regression, and has on a couple of occasions bought his own diapers as an aid.
The other person is a former friend/romantic interest, and current coworker, that had a thing around this time last year. It was during a lull in the relationship between me and the first person I mentioned, and I suppose I filled that intimate void with this boy instead. We had started talking more and more at work, and eventually began hanging out at each others apartments and going out to eat. We began getting more intimate, and I began to think that I loved him. I told him at some point. In retrospect, I was a lot less confident in my decision to tell him, I think because we also worked together. It was basically "okay, well, I am this thing. *Provides summary of what it entails and that i was kind of born with it*. But you can't tell anyone from work about it. Ever." He accepted it, and even participated in changing me a few times. A couple of months went by, and I ended up wrecking the relationship by saying stupid, not-well-thought out things. However, I do think he was waiting for me to 'fuck up', in a sense. Either way, it's over now and I've dealt with it.
The latter relationship really damaged my trust issues in a big way. Even though the relationship was short lived, when it ended it struck some big nerves in me that made getting through the following months a living hell. I have worked at the same place for 2 years. Being an introvert and having undiagnosed mental illness(es), its not super easy for me to connect with other people. It's challenging to initiate conversation, and even worse, keep said conversation going. I felt like, and still feel like, a black sheep at my place of work, because I can't just fucking interact normally with people like everyone else. There is a big clique of hip people that work there that are best friends with each other, and I feel a bit left out of that. Having said all of that, my friendship/relationship with this latter person felt like a break in the clouds. Here was someone who was on MY side, who was my friend in this group and would stick up for me. When the relationship ended, however, it went back to how it was before, but even worse. I felt completely isolated and ostracized. Even now, I don't go to social gatherings that are organized by people from work because I suspect that this particular person will be there, not to mention crippling social anxiety and an inability to just "hang out" and be a normal, non-awkward being. I felt like he had everything, and I had nothing. It was even worse when people would exclaim "OH SWEET BABY R**! i love you so much!" at him, but then that same person would pass me by and snub me, even if I tried to be friendly. I felt that all of this reinforced to me that I should stuff my true self deeper and deeper inside because it's just not acceptable to people. It also made me re-evaluate how much trust I put in everybody I knew, even family members.
Over the past few months, I've been trying my best to keep my head above water, and have rebounded from those dark times. However, there are more dark times to combat in the present and in the future.